


The Ghosts That Make Us (Explanations, the plus one)

by emma221b



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Confused John, Developing Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Drama, Drug Addict Sherlock, Embarrassed Sherlock, Greg Lestrade & Sherlock Holmes Friendship, Illnesses, John-centric, M/M, Original Character(s), Past Relationship(s), Paternal Lestrade, Post-Episode: The Abominable Bride, Protective John, Sherlock Holmes & John Watson Friendship, Sherlock Holmes Has Feelings, Sherlock Holmes and Drug Use, Sherlock Is A Bit Not Good, Sherlock Is Not Okay, Teen Angst, Teen Sherlock, Teenage Sherlock, Younger Mycroft, Younger Sherlock, sherlocks first case, sherlocks past
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-29
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-06-05 06:30:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6693241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emma221b/pseuds/emma221b
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'Nobody made me; I made me.'</p><p>When ghosts from his past return to haunt Sherlock, John has to do some detective work of his own to discover how best to help him.</p><p>Set post-TAB, rated M for references to violent crimes and drug use.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story started life as 'the plus one' to Explanations, but as so often happens, it seems to have taken on a life of its own.
> 
> It is set immediately after the plane scene in TAB. Hope you enjoy it.

Sherlock Holmes and John Watson were sitting in companionable silence in the living room of 221b Baker Street; each had a pipe of tobacco in their mouth, and there was a fire burning in the hearth. Holmes felt a rare moment of contentment as he watched the flames. Another case solved, and the prospect of more to come. Watson was back where he should be, in his old seat at 221b, and while both of them were well aware that later he would make his excuses and return home to Hampstead, neither of them chose to mention it.

'Sherlock - time to wake up now.'

The voice seemed to come from nowhere. Holmes looked round, but could see no-one, and Watson seemed blissfully unaware of the intrusion.

'Come on, Sherlock, we need you to wake up.'

There it was again - the disembodied voice. Where was it coming from? He stood up, trying to put down his pipe which seemed oddly wedged in his mouth. Uncomfortably wedged, now he came to think about it and located much too far back. It felt as if the stem was being forced down his throat. He coughed, trying to dislodge it, then started to gag, clutching his throat, gasping for breath and frantically signaling at Watson to help him, but Watson remained motionless, staring into the flames as if frozen in time. Holmes staggered towards him, but his legs wouldn't hold him and he fell, not onto the floor but straight through it as his eyes snapped open to...

Lights. Bright lights. Too bright. And voices, talking to him, telling him to breathe out and then with a horrifying rasp, the pipe stem was removed and he could breathe again. Something was placed over his nose and mouth, and he tried to push it away but a hand seized his, stopping him.

'Leave it, Sherlock, it's just an oxygen mask. You're in hospital, you need to lie still.'

John, it was John Watson. The voice was John's, and so was the hand still holding onto his. Curiously he found that he didn't mind the physical contact. He found it rather comforting.

He blinked, trying hard to focus and then tried to sit up, but he felt oddly weak. The hand not restrained by John was tethered somehow, preventing him from moving. Where was he? Was he still on the plane? Had he miscalculated the dose somehow and passed out? He had been in his Mind Palace, projecting himself deliberately back into Victorian times to solve the case of Emilia Ricoletti and solve it he had.

'John -' he tried to say, but his voice came out as a croak.

'Don't try to talk,' John said to him. 'You've been intubated. Your throat is going to be pretty sore for a day or two. Just lie still.'

He blinked again, trying desperately to focus on John. 'What -' he managed.

'You're in hospital, Sherlock. In Intensive Care. You overdosed, nearly stopped breathing. Bloody good job I had my visit bag in the boot of the car and could give you some naloxone. It didn't wake you up, but at least it kept you breathing until the ambulance got there.'

Overdosed? He hadn't done that in a very long time. Not since before he'd met John in fact. He was always so carefully with doses and timings, but there had been an urgency this time that had made him careless. That together with the reduction in his tolerance caused by the enforced abstinence for his week-long stay in custody must have been enough to tip him over the edge.

He looked at John who seemed to have just realised that he was still holding Sherlock's hand and let it go.

'What time is it?' he asked, his voice still croaky.

John looked at his watch, 'Three twenty-five in the afternoon' he said.

Three twenty-five. Good. He hadn't lost too much time then. The plane had taken off at 10.15am, he had only lost a few hours.

'You didn't ask what day it was,' John said, watching his expression. 'It's Friday. You've been unconscious for over a day.'

'Moriarty!' Sherlock croaks, trying to sit up again, only to be pushed back by John.

'Mycroft is dealing with it. It's just a computer virus anyway, that's all. A complex hack. He's tracking it down, but it looks as if it could all be a scam. No signs of anything sinister that he can find.'

'Emilia Ricoletti -'

'Why do you keep going on about her? It's not the same case, Sherlock. You proved that Moriarty really was dead, good for you. Yes, it's possible that somebody is taking on his persona, and trying to reactivate his network - the bits that you left behind anyway. Or this could just be a copycat trying to cash in on his fame. Either way, it got you a pardon and you're off the case.'

Sherlock pulled the oxygen mask away from his face before John could stop him. 'How can I be off the case?' he asked.

John grimaced. 'Mycroft is pretty pissed off with you. He says you're not going anywhere near another case - not even this one, until you've proved that you're clean.'

'Clean?'

'They drug-tested you, Sherlock. You lit up every single one of the urine dipstick tests like a Christmas tree. That was the six drug version. Then they tried the ten stick version, and you lit up pretty much every single one of those too. Tell me is there anything that you didn't take?'

'PCP' Sherlock said sleepily. 'Never touch the stuff.' The bed was comfortable, it had some kind of air mattress on it, which cushioned his aching body perfectly. He was withdrawing, not badly, he hadn't been on high enough doses of anything for the last few weeks for full withdrawal, but the come down from that quantity of medication could last for days and would be unpleasant enough.

If he wasn't allowed to work on a case then he might as well make the most of the opportunity to sleep. He hadn't been able to do much other than pace, smoke and contemplate his imminent demise for the last week. Confinement, as Mycroft had so accurately deduced, hadn't come easily to him. Too much time locked up with only his own thoughts for company rarely led to constructive conclusions. He closed his eyes.

'Hey! ' John said, shaking his shoulder. 'Wake up. I need to talk to you.'

Sherlock opened his eyes for long enough to glare at him. 'Later, John,' he said.

'No, now. How long has this been going on and why the hell didn't you tell me?'

'Tell you what?'

'Oh, I don't know - that you had a serious drug habit? That you were shooting up every time my back was turned?'

'That's what bothers you most isn't it? That I somehow deceived you.'

'Don't change the subject.'

'What would you have had me say?'

'Oh I don't know - how about, 'John, I'm using drugs and I need help to stop?'

'I don't need help.'

'Because you think that you can just stop?'

'No, because I have no intention of stopping.'

Sherlock yawned and closed his eyes. John, meanwhile, was resisting the urge to either shake or punch Sherlock for discussing his drug habit as nonchalantly as if he was discussing his refusal to stop smoking twenty Marlboro Red a day. In Sherlock's current state, however, neither was advisable.

'They think you were trying to kill yourself, you know that?' John said once he was calm enough to trust himself to speak. 'Even Mycroft isn't convinced that wasn't what you were trying to do.'

'It was a one-way mission, John,' Sherlock said drowsily. 'I didn't have to kill myself. Other people would have taken great pleasure in doing that for me.'

...

When he woke again, he was back in 221b Baker Street, but the Victorian version it. He was sitting in his chair, dozing in front of the fire and John was sitting opposite him. The modern John, not the Victorian one. And when he looked down, Sherlock found that he was wearing his normal twenty-first century clothes too - his suit, dressed for work. Dreaming or in his Mind Palace? He couldn't tell.

'Where are we?' John asked.

'Baker Street, as it was in Victorian times.'

'And why are we here?'

'I don't know. Maybe I need to work something out.'

'Any idea what?'

'None whatsoever.'

'You're going to have to tell me at some point, you know,' John said conversationally.

'Tell you what?'

John chuckled, stood up, walked over to Sherlock, and leaning over the arm of the chair, kissed him, without drama and without pre-amble.

With a start, Sherlock woke up.

It was almost dark in the hospital now, the room lit only by a single light on the corner and he was in a different room, a private room, the monitors and buzz of the intensive care unit replaced by white walls and a flat-screen television.

A figure was sitting beside his bed, and without even turning his head he knew that it was not John, but Mycroft.

'You're going to have to tell him, you know,' he said as Sherlock turned to look at him.

'Tell him what?'

'You know precisely what.'

'What happened to love being an emotion found on the losing side?'

'Without John Watson, you would have been dead years ago. We both know that. Don't throw that away.'

'I'm not throwing anything away.'

'Aren't you? Don't try to be a martyr, Sherlock. It doesn't suit you.'

'You're being ridiculous.'

'We both know that I'm not, though, don't we? You threw yourself off a roof to protect John Watson; you spent two years chasing round the world pretending to be James Bond, destroying Moriarty's network for him. And then, when you return and find that he has replaced you, you throw yourself into preserving his new relationship above all else. You make a public vow to do so, in fact. And in the name of that vow, you fail to unveil Mary Watson as the killer that she is, you protect her identity, you risk your life to ensure that John discovers the truth in a way that has the greatest chance of preserving their relationship. And then you shoot Magnussen because he humiliates John.'

'I shot Magnussen because he needed to die.'

'You shot Magnussen because you see yourself as a dragon slayer and John Watson as your damsel in distress.'

'Is that what you really think?'

'Perhaps it's time that you started being honest with yourself, Sherlock.'

'Go away, Mycroft.'

'Why? Because I'm getting too close to home?'

Mycroft leant forwards. 'Sherlock, you're into this deep - you and I both know it, and we know where it led before. You need a reason to stop using and the single reason that could possibly be powerful enough to make you do that is John Watson.'

'What makes you think that I want to stop using?'

'What makes you think that I'm going to give you a choice?'

Sherlock glared at Mycroft.

'Don't be an idiot, Sherlock. You know that I always win.'

'Go away, Mycroft,' Sherlock repeated.

'You could just tell him, you know.'

Sherlock let out a sarcastic snort. 'What - declare my undying love for him? '

'If you feel so inclined, but that's not what I'm talking about, as you are well aware.'

'Leave it, Mycroft.''

'Just tell him, Sherlock. If you don't, then I will.'

...

When he opened his eyes again, he was back in the squat. Lying on the mattress in the corner of the room, staring at the sheet that hung over the doorway in place of a door. He wasn't alone. He could hear soft breathing beside him and rolled over to look into eyes even bluer than his. Christoph's pupils were still tiny from last night's hit, making his eyes even more startling than normal.

'You need to tell him, you know.' he said.

Sherlock sighed and sat up, wrapping his arms round his skinny jeans-clad legs in an almost forgotten gesture. Sixteen years old, and already on the scrap heap. A teenage junkie, living rough, doing whatever he had to in order to pay for his habit. It was only transport after all.

'Don't you start,' he told him. He hasn't dreamt of Christoph for years, not since his last stint in rehab. It was as if moving into 221b with John had banished Christoph from his mind entirely. But part of him had returned to Sherlock's subconscious in Serbia when he was being tortured. The voice that he had heard in his head then, telling him to hold on, had always been Christoph's, never John's.

'You need to let me go, Sherlock.'

'I have.'

Christoph chuckled, a forgotten sound that still made Sherlock's heart skip uncomfortably.

'Is that what you think? I was your first proper case with the police with the police, wasn't I? You blamed yourself for my death and you set out to avenge it. If it hadn't been for Greg Lestrade, you would have ended up dead, too.'

'I should never have let you go with that punter. Not on your own. I knew he was dangerous.'

'We needed the money. You couldn't have known what he would take me into.'

'I should have realised. I should have worked it out. I should have been able to save you.'

'Sherlock, we were high as kites most of the time. We put ourselves in danger every day. You couldn't have known.'

'I should have known,' Sherlock protested stubbornly,

Christoph sighed and reached out a hand to push a curl away from Sherlock's eyes. 'I never meant for you to shut yourself off like this, you know,' he said. 'This wasn't what I wanted for you.'

Sherlock closed his eyes and reached out for Christoph's hand, but as always happened in his dreams, his hand slid straight through him, like the ghost that he was.

'Stop sacrificing yourself for those you love, Sherlock. They deserve better than that.'

'Better than being protected?'

Christoph shook his head, 'It's not just about protecting them though is it? If you love him, then you have to trust him with your past. All of your past. I wouldn't have died if it hadn't been for the drugs. You have to stop running away.'

'But he has Mary now. He has the child.'

'Does he, though?'' Christoph's reply faded, as he slowly disappeared into mist.

...

'You were talking in your sleep,' John said as Sherlock opened his eyes.

'Was I? What was I saying?'

John shook his head. 'A lot of rubbish mainly,' he said and Sherlock didn't know whether to feel relieved or disappointed.

Then John asked curiously, 'Who's Christoph?'

And Sherlock just stared at him for a long moment.

'No really, who is Christoph? You kept shouting his name and you sounded upset.'

'Tell him,' echoed Mycroft's voice in his head.

'Tell him,' whispered Christoph's voice, and it was gentle and loving in a way that it had rarely been in life.

'Tell me who he was, Sherlock,' John said. 'You were almost screaming.'

And Sherlock looked at John, hazel eyes instead of blue, but in them was the same care that had been in Christoph's. And more - in his eyes Sherlock saw compassion and understanding, and maybe, just possibly, something even deeper than that.

His closed his eyes against their power, and shook his head slightly, trying to resist the temptation to let his guard down, to just let it all out. It would be a relief, wouldn't it? To finally tell someone after all these years?

There was a hand on his arm - warm and reassuring. 'You can trust me, you know,' John said. 'Whatever it is, whatever happened, I'm still here for you.'

Sherlock swallowed hard, 'Christoph was my first case with Lestrade,' he began, but his voice cracked mid-sentence and he found himself unable to continue.

'Ask him, John,' he said, finally, when he had regained control sufficiently to trust himself to speak. 'Ask Lestrade to tell you about it. Tell him that he needs to tell you everything.'


	2. Chapter 2

Greg walked over to the table that John had appropriated in the corner of the snug and sat down, placing his pint carefully on the beer mat in front of hm.

'So what's this all about? It sounded urgent. Sherlock's okay isn't he?'

'He's getting there. He's still a bit dopey, but he's off the naloxone infusion. They're hoping to release him tomorrow, but he has to be seen by the mental health team first. Hospital policy, even though he swears blind that it was an accidental overdose.'

'Christ, that's going to go well. He'll eat them for breakfast.'

'I've told him to behave himself. The last thing he needs is to end up being sectioned because he's being a difficult arse.'

'What about the Drug and Alcohol Team - isn't he seeing somebody about the fact that he's shooting up again?'

John pulled a face. 'They tried. He refused. You know what he's like, Greg.'

'Still won't admit that he's got a problem?'

'Of course not. He's a "user", not an addict. It's all completely within his control. He doesn't need help, and more to the point, he appears to have absolutely no intention of stopping using.'

Greg shook his head. 'Stupid fucker. Would it help if I talked to him?'

'Maybe. It's worth a try. I'd wait until he got home though. I thought I might see what Molly could do too.'

'Molly? You think that he'll listen to her? I'm fond of Molly, don't get me wrong, but why her?'

'He trusted her with his life during that whole Moriarty thing, don't forget. Trusted her more, as it turns out than he trusted me.'

'That's not the point, John and you know it.'

'Yeah, yeah, but either way, she's good at getting through to people. Even Sherlock. For whatever reason, he does seem to listen to her. And she's furious with him for starting using again. So maybe, just maybe, she'll be able to get through to him. He's certainly not listening to me.'

'Anything is worth a shot I suppose. Although from past experience, he won't stop until he's forced into a corner. He never has before.'

'And that brings me onto what I wanted to talk to you about. You've known Sherlock for a long time haven't you?'

'Since he was a guttersnipe of a sixteen-year-old runaway, yeah. Off his head on heroin or whatever drugs he could get his hands on most of the time, but when he wasn't high, he could still out-deduce the best of us, even back then.'

John looked confused. 'Hang on, when I first met you, you told me you'd only known him for five years.'

'Oh, that. Yes, I did, didn't I?' Greg said. 'That's what I always say. If somebody asked me tomorrow how long I'd known him for, I'd say, 'Five years.' That's what we agreed. Although I should probably up it to ten now to make it more believable. He doesn't like people knowing about his past. Keeps it simple this way.'

'Until now,' John said, frowning. 'He wants me to know about his past. He told me to ask you to tell me about the first case that you worked with him.'

'The first case? Blimey John, that was over twenty years ago. Why do you want to know about that?'

'He told me to ask you. He was shouting in his sleep after the overdose. About somebody called Christoph. Said it was the first case that he worked with you. He started to talk to me and then he got distressed. More upset than I've ever seen him. Told me to ask you about it because you'd be able to explain it better than he could. Told me to tell you not to pull any punches.'

Lestrade blew out his cheeks and looked uncomfortable.

'Greg? What is it?'

'It's not a particularly pleasant story, John. Are you sure he said that I should tell you everything?'

'That's what he said, yes. His exact words.'

Lestrade let out his breath in a puff. 'Well if that's what he said, then I suppose I ought to start at the beginning. Christoph Savatier. That was his name. Blonde kid - French. Had sneaked his way over here on the ferry thinking that the streets of London were paved with gold. Instead, he found they were paved with heroin and crack cocaine.'

'He was a junkie?'

'Big time. And he obtained his money for drugs the traditional way - by working on the streets.'

'How did Sherlock know him?'

Lestrade hesitated. 'He didn't tell you this?'

'He told me that he was a friend, that he'd come to see you to report him missing, and ended up helping on the case. He wouldn't say anything more.'

'My guess is that he was more than a friend, John. They shared a room in the squat they were staying in. There was only one mattress in it and two sets of clothes if you get my meaning.'

'Sherlock was in a relationship with him?'

'Of sorts, yes.'

John covered his confusion by taking a long, slow swig of his beer, all kinds of images suddenly swimming into his head, his entire concept of Sherlock's younger life suddenly shifting. Sherlock in a relationship. Sherlock living in a squat with another man. In one bed. He hadn't seen that coming.

They sat in silence for several minutes, John's mind turning the information over and over, trying to work out what it meant. Finally, he realised that the silence was becoming uncomfortable, and Greg being the good policeman that he was, obviously wasn't going to speak again until John had expressed an opinion.

'So what happened?' John asked, side-stepping the issue.

Greg looked oddly relieved at the change in direction and made a substantial dent in his own pint before launching into the story. Emotions weren't really his area. Facts were something that as a policeman he found much easier to deal with.

'First time that I met Sherlock Holmes, I was on a late shift at Paddington nick,' he said. 'Front desk phoned and said there was some street kid asking to speak to the Detective in charge. They said he was refusing to talk to anybody else. So I went down to see what was going on.

'And there was this ridiculously skinny, gangly teenager, arguing holes in the poor PC manning the reception desk. His clothes were hanging off him, he looked as if he hadn't eaten or slept in about a week and his hair obviously hadn't seen a brush for a lot longer than that. I took him into the interview room, and he told me that his friend had been murdered. Just like that. I asked him how he knew and he told me that nobody had seen this friend of his for three days, and he'd found blood stains and signs of somebody being restrained on a chair in an old warehouse in Clapham. But no body and no trace of one. I asked him how he knew that it was his friend's blood and he produced three blonde hairs from a plastic bag in his pocket, apologised that he hadn't had a proper evidence bag, said that he'd found them in the warehouse, and told me that they were Christoph's.

'And were they?'

'Unfortunately, yes. The DNA matched that on his toothbrush that we picked up from the squat. I tried to dismiss what Sherlock was saying at first - told him that there a million and one reasons that the blood stains could be on the floor but that I'd get a patrol to go down there and have a look. He started shouting at me about preserving the scene and contaminating evidence, sounded just like my old DI. Turned out he'd been reading forensics books and police cases - not crime novels, proper cases from the papers and textbooks and even law court libraries since he was nine. His knowledge was pretty impressive, if a little patchy.

'I offered to let him go down there with the patrol, to show them what he'd found. Told him that I'd tell them to be careful, and if there was anything significant, then I'd go down there myself with a forensics team.

'He seemed a bit happier with that plan. Then I asked him when he'd last eaten and he said that he couldn't remember, I got him a sandwich, which he demolished in about five seconds. He was on his third before he started talking again.

'I asked him why he was so sure that his friend had been murdered - people on the streets disappear all the time, and he said that Christoph would never have left him. Not without saying goodbye. I asked him if Christoph was more than a friend and he said that it was complicated, but that they looked out for each other. Turned out Christoph had gone off with a punter the night he disappeared, and had never returned.'

Greg hesitated, flashing a look at John as if unsure whether to continue, 'What is it?' John asked.

'You sure Sherlock said he was happy for you to tell me everything?'

'That's what he said. Why? What don't you want to tell me.'

'John - the punter Christoph went off with. He had originally propositioned Sherlock.'

'And Sherlock had said that he wasn't for sale, presumably. So what? Must happened all the time on the streets.'

'No John, you don't understand. Sherlock _was_ for sale in those days - that is, he wasn't averse to turning tricks for money, although he had his limits. It's just that he didn't trust the punter. Said he got a bad vibe from him. He'd turned to walk away and Christoph had offered to get into the car instead.'

'So -'

'So he felt responsible for Christoph's death,' Lestrade said seriously. 'Probably still does. He thought it should have been him.'

'Fuck. Poor Sherlock. No wonder he still has nightmares about him.'

'You don't seem particularly shocked, John.'

'What? That Sherlock turned tricks to buy drugs, or that he had a boyfriend?'

'Both.'

'Well, to be honest, I always assumed that his tastes ran more to men than to women, when he allowed them to run to anything. He was always so adamant that it wasn't his area, though. He just wouldn't discuss it, and believe me I've tried to get him to tell me about his past. I assumed that he was – I don't know, asexual, I suppose. Some people are. But I always wondered if something hadn't happened to make him shut himself off like he did. Was that it do you think?'

'I never knew him before, but it would make sense. They argued about Christoph getting in the car apparently. Sherlock didn't want him to go, but Christoph had said that they needed the money. That was the last time Sherlock ever saw him alive.'

'Did you ever find him?'

'Three days later, wrapped in plastic and weighted down in the bottom of a canal. He was almost unrecognisable. Sherlock insisted on identifying him. I wasn't keen - he was too young, I was sure of it. Although he swore blind that he was eighteen, he didn't look more than fifteen. I wanted to wait until Christoph's parents came over from France, but Sherlock was adamant, and we needed an ID quickly. It was a nasty business.'

'How did he react?'

'He managed to identify him. Then he vomited into the fire bucket in the corner, came back to the body, inspected it from head to foot with some ridiculous plastic key-ring magnifying glass that looked as if he had got it out of a Christmas cracker, and insisted on being shown a copy of the post-mortem report so that he could work out the cause of death and the likely perpetrators.'

'Did you show it to him?'

'Of course not. But I was intrigued by what he'd said. He'd implied that there was more than one person responsible.'

'And was there?'

Greg grimaced. 'Nasty business. We found evidence of rape and DNA from three different men on the rectal swabs. None of it was Sherlock's. Of course, he didn't know about the forensic information at the time.'

'Christ,' John muttered. The pub suddenly felt very hot. 'I need a slash - I'll go via the bar on the way back and get us refills.'

There was a fire door open as he walked out through the snug behind the main bar towards the Gents. It opened onto a small courtyard, used as a beer garden in summer, populated only by the most hardy of smokers in the winter. John let himself out of the door and sat on one of the benches, grateful that he had the area to himself, letting the cool evening air take the heat out of the conversation that he'd just had.

So Sherlock had been - what. A prostitute? A rent boy? He really didn't want to consider the implications of that. Why did it even matter? It had been years ago, so why was he bothered by it? Addicts did whatever they needed to in order to get enough money for a fix. He knew that. And Sherlock had been - what, fifteen? Sixteen? On the streets, under the radar, not even able to claim the homeless allowance for fear of being found and returned home. Christ, how desperate must he have been to go down that route? He presumed that was when Sherlock had learnt his pickpocketing skills too.

He stood up reluctantly; Greg would be wondering where he had got to. A quick trip to the Gents and he had got back to the table, sitting down before he realised that he'd forgotten the beer.

'You okay?' Greg asked as John apologised and got up again. 'It's a bit of a shock if you didn't know, isn't it? I mean looking at him now you'd never know.'

'It's fine,' John said, knowing even as he said it that it wasn't. That he was more bothered by this than he cared to admit. 'I'll go and get those beers.'

His phone pinged with a text as he was waiting at the bar.

**Sorry if I shocked you John - SH**

John groaned.

**Why didn't you tell me? - JW**

**You never asked - SH**

What was that meant to mean? He hesitated before texting back.

**Was Christoph your boyfriend? – JW**

**It depends on your definition of the term - SH**

Followed almost immediately by:

**We shared a bed. We had a low-level of physical relationship. - SH**

'Low-level of physical relationship,' what the hell was that meant to mean? John wondered, finger hovering over his phone keyboard, trying to work out how to phrase his question as his phone pinged again, making him jump

**To be specific, we never slept together – SH**

Followed a few seconds later by:

**At least not in the biological sense of the term - SH**

How did he do that? It was as if he could read John's mind. Still – kind of him to clarify.

You're welcome – SH

The sarcastic reply pre-empted John's reaction yet again.

**Why didn't you tell me yourself? - JW**

**I thought you'd find it easier this way - SH**

John hesitated, wanting to send a flippant message back telling Sherlock that he didn't think that it was John he'd been thinking about. But then he remembered the night at Leinster Gardens. Everything that Sherlock had done to ensure that he'd heard the information from the right person at the right time. Christ, was he doing the same thing again - filling John in on his own past and not Mary's? His heart thumped and he had an odd sense of elation. Why was Sherlock doing this?

**Why now? - JW**

**Because it was the right time - SH**

Right time for what? John wondered. Why was Sherlock telling him all of this now? Because of the drugs, or for other reasons that John didn't even want to contemplate at the moment?

'This is ridiculous,' he muttered to himself, then stepping outside the door of the pub, he pressed the call button. Sherlock might hate speaking on the phone, but John was damned if he was having this conversation by text.

Predictably, it clicked to answer phone immediately. Sherlock had rejected his call.

 **Pick up, damn you – JH** , he texted.

And almost immediately the phone in his hand rang.

'I was very young, John. And very desperate. Please try to remember that,' Sherlock said, without any pre-amble.

'I'm not judging you, Sherlock.'

'Aren't you? Perhaps you should.'

'You're not the same person, and besides from what I've heard, you have nothing to reproach yourself for. You were a child. It wasn't your fault. Now tell me what happened.'

'I can't, John. Ask Lestrade,' Sherlock said, his voice heavy with emotion.

'Why now, Sherlock? Why tell me now?'

'Because I am informed by numerous sources that you need to know,' Sherlock said, an edge of bitterness to his voice. 'Talk to Lestrade, John. Then you'll understand.'

And with a click, he was gone.


	3. Chapter 3

'Has he been messaging you too?' John asked as he returned to the table with two fresh pints of Adnams to see Greg shaking his head at his mobile phone.

'He just can't leave it alone can he? Irritating bastard. He says I'm to make sure I tell you everything.'

'What's this all about, Greg? Do you know? Why now?'

'Honestly? I think that he's scared, John.'

'Scared? Sherlock? He hardly ever gets scared. Horrified that he's been outwitted, yes, but few people other than Moriarty have ever really got to him.'

Greg shook his head. 'You didn't know him before,' he said. 'By the time that you came along he'd sorted himself out, cleaned himself up, got off the drugs and was making a reputation for himself. If you'd seen him a year before that, you'd understand why he's scared. If he's slipped and is seriously using again, then we're all in for a hell of a ride.'

'How many times has he been through detox and rehab?'

'At least three that I know of - that's offficially. I suspect at least twice that number on his own.'

'Why does he never talk about it?'

'I imagine that he's 'deleted it' from that memory of his. That's what he seems to do with a lot of uncomfortable stuff.'

'So why hasn't he deleted Christoph?'

'Maybe the memories weren't entirely bad.'

'Do you think that -'

'That he loved him? I'm sure that he did, John.'

'What can you tell me about him?' John asked. Wondering why he was desperate for details. 'Why did Sherlock care so much about him, do you know? Why him?'

'Christoph was a year older,' Greg explained. 'He was different, he spoke a different language. He and Sherlock conversed almost entirely in French did you know that? He'd taught him fluent French within a couple of weeks, imagine that,' Greg shook his head. 'It's as much as I can do to ask for steak and chips.'

'Did he speak it at all before that?' John asked, fascinated.

'Schoolboy French he told me, and a couple of holidays in France but that was it. Turns out that when they met, Christoph's English was worse than Sherlock's French, so they went for the simplest communication option.'

'He would have liked the challenge of that.'

'I'm sure that he did.'

'So what happened to him, did you find out?'

'That first day, I ended up going to the warehouse to investigate myself, with one of the juniors. Sherlock was right. There were bloodstains there and signs of a struggle. Looked as if the kid had been tied to a chair and beaten bloody. There was a mattress in the corner, with blood and goodness knows what all over it. Forensics indicated they'd raped him once he was too out of it to resist.'

'And then they killed him? Why?'

'It was part of the pattern, John. Christoph wasn't the first.'

'Jesus, you mean it was - what - a serial killer?'

'More of a paedophile ring whose tastes ran to the sadistic. Christoph was the oldest of the boys that they took.'

'How many?' John asked, trying to force down the urge to vomit.'

'Four - that we knew of. Sherlock helped us nail the bastards. We secured convictions for rape and murder for three of the men, four others with various conspiracy to assist and paedophile charges.'

'For what?'

Greg pulled a face. 'They liked to watch,' he explained.

John closed his eyes and turned his head away for several minutes, trying to work out if he was going to have to make a dash to the Gents to vomit after all. Eventually he took a sip of his beer, then another. It helped.'

'You okay?' Greg asked.

'Not really, no.'

'For what it's worth, it's probably the most vile investigation I've ever been involved in.'

'And Sherlock nearly became victim number four. No wonder he became obsessed with murders.'

'It's worse than that, John. He nearly became victim number five. He tried to set himself up as bait.'

'Of course he would, the stupid bastard,' John murmured. 'How did you stop him?'

'Fortunately I found him before they did, worked out what he was up to. Arrested him, threatened to charge him with soliciting and possession with intent to supply unless he told me what the hell he was up to.'

'And?'

'And when we searched him at the nick we discovered that he'd rigged himself up with a fairly sophisticated recording device, programmed to broadcast any sounds in the vicinity onto the police network with the touch of a button. It also contained a tracking device to ensure that we would find him.'

'So what was he planning to do?

'As soon as he was picked up, he was going to activate the device, it and do his damnedest get us all of the information that we needed to convict every single person in that gang.'

'But how did he know you'd find him in time?'

'He didn't, John. That's was the point. He was going to sacrifice himself to catch Christoph's killers and he was furious when we prevented him from doing just that.'

John paused to consider. So this martyrdom complex, this willingness to sacrifice himself for those he cared about and for the greater good wasn't new. And yet it seemed to run so contrary to Sherlock's general unawareness of the emotions of others on a day to day basis.

'Not others,' said a voice in his head. 'Just strangers. He cares if he upsets you - or Molly, or even Mrs Hudson. He does care, he just lacks the emotional intelligence to work out the consequences of his actions before he's carried them out.'

'So did you charge him?' he asked Lestrade.

'No. He didn't have enough on him to charge him with more than possession, and we cautioned him for that. Besides, I felt sorry for the kid. We got him a shower and some clean clothes and I found him a bed in a hostel for a few nights. Told him if he could keep himself straight for a few days then he could help us. Then I went back to the nick and started trying to work out who he was.'

'Couldn't have been many Sherlock Holmes on the missing persons list, surely?

'Well that was the problem. He wasn't listed as Sherlock, he was listed as William, known as Will, because that was what his parents called him in those days. And he hadn't given us his surname. I had a flick through the database but there were hundreds of teenage runaways on there, and before the days of digital cameras it was all bad photocopies and dodgy school photos. Sherlock had short hair in the picture that his parents had provided. He'd been on the streets for nearly six months by the time I met him and he'd changed almost beyond recognition from living unde those conditions.'

'But he'd left us a big clue. The transmitter he'd wired himself up to was state of the art. Not the sort of thing you could pick up on the street, and the Internet hardly existed in those days. I had it analysed - took ten days for the results to come back, turns out it was security service issue and they'd rather like it back please.'

'So how - Mycroft?' John asked.

'Precisely. Turns out Sherlock had broken into his big brothers flat to help himself to some cash and found that in the process. Mycroft was in the early days of his training back then. Got into a ton of flak for leaving equipment lying around until Sherlock later admitted he'd taken it out of Mycroft's safe after cracking the code. After that they tried to recruit him to GCHQ, but of course he was having none of it.'

'So how did that help you work out who he was?'

'I made discreet enquiries about if any of the agents had a teenager relative who'd gone missing. It was a long shot but it worked. A week later, Mycroft Holmes phoned me to arrange a meeting with and brought with him a picture of Sherlock.

'And you recognised him?'

'I couldn't be sure, but there was something about Mycroft that reminded me of him -an imperiousness, I suppose. Then Mycroft started telling me about Sherlock and the more he told me, the more I was sure he was talking about the same person.'

'And they had a happy reunion?'

'Of course not. Sherlock had left the hostel before we got there. Didn't track him down for three weeks and then he was found unconscious under a bridge. He'd overdosed. But at least we knew who to call.'

'And the case?'

'Was solved by then. Turned out Sherlock had worked out where two of the other boys had been picked up from but hadn't chosen to share the information with us because he knew I'd stop him using himself as bait. Correctly as it turned out. Even back then he'd realised that people would tell him things they wouldn't tell us. Based on the information he got from the other street kids, he worked out that the gang had tried it on with lots of other boys, but they'd got spooked. He worked out where they were hunting, the colour and probable make of the van they used, everything.'

'Why didn't he just tell you?'

'Didn't trust us,' Greg said. 'He was an arrogant sod, even back then. Reckoned he could do a better job himself. The information that he gave us enabled us to track them down after he did his disappearing act.'

'So that was how you met Sherlock,' John said, surprised to discover that his pint glass was almost empty again.

'That was how I met Sherlock,' Lestrade agreed. 'You can see why he's not keen on me sharing that story. Not with most people, anyway. But then you're not most people.'

'How do we get through to him, Greg?' John asked. 'How do we get him to stop using?'

Greg looked puzzled. 'You can't,' he said. 'You know that. You've worked with enough addicts in your time, you must have. Only Sherlock can stop Sherlock using. All we can do is support him.'

'I want to shake him by the scruff of the neck and send him off to a remote Hebridean island where there are no drugs in sight,' John said.

'Won't work,' Greg said with a grin. 'I tried it. The shaking that is. Many times. Shaking, shouting, threatening with arrest. None of it works. He'll stop when he decides he wants to, and when he does, he'll just do it. Oh, I'm not saying that it will be easy, or that he won't slip a few times along the way, but he'll do it and he'll be clean for months or years and then the cycle will start all over again.'

'So how do you break the cycle?'

'Well you can't, can you?' Greg said. 'He's an addict, John. He'll always be an addict. The cases, they were a way to distract him, they give him a different kind of fix, but he's always looking for the high, always will be. I don't think you can change that.'

'So what - I shouldn't try?'

'You shouldn't feel responsible, John,' Greg said, standing up and picking up the empty pint glasses. 'He's an adult. He can look after himself. Well most of the time. He'll do it when he's good and ready, as I say. Now how about another pint and something to eat? They do a good burger here.'

John nodded and pulled out his phone to check his messages as Greg headed towards the bar.

**Well? SH**

**I think that I understand now JW**

**Astound me SH**

**It was the beginning of it all JW**

**Don't pity me John SH**

**I wouldn't dream of it JW**

And then - radio silence. No more messages.

Greg returned with the beer and the menus, they ordered food and spent the rest of the evening doing what two men do in a pub - drinking, eating and talking about anything and everything as long as it didn't involve emotions or the nearly impossible task that they had in front of them

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it. For now. If you'd like more then do please let me know. I'm always open to pleas. And to bribery and corruption of course
> 
> This story is for everyone who read and commented on the original Explanations series - your enthusiasm is what inspired me to keep going with this one. Thank you so much for all of your fantastic feedback.
> 
> Thanks as ever go to my amazing beta team of J_Baillier and 7percentsolution for helping me iron out the creases


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